There has been anti-semitism in Europe ever since significant populations of Jews began migrating there 2,000 years ago, and there have been brutal exclusionary laws, pogroms, and acts of genocide against them ever since.
The KKK has been in existence since the end of the American Civil War. After the war, there was chaos in the South. Slaves were given their freedom and displaced from their homes, which were usually owned by their masters. The result was that there were roving hordes of freed yet starving slaves all over the South. They were described as “locusts” upon the landscape, stealing everything in sight and there were some killings, but it is difficult at this late date to determine how much of this was real and how much was hyperbole.
Post- war political leaders such as former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forest formed groups of armed horsemen to hold down law and order. They soon found that if they dressed like ghosts, rode at night with fiery torches, they were more effective in terrorizing the black population into submission.
Under the brutal policies of Reconstruction and martial law as imposed by the North upon the South, the KKK evolved into a highly organized, secretive terrorist organization against the new policies and northern government appointments of Blacks into key southern states administrative positions. By the end of Reconstruction, there were chapters in every state there to impose Jim Crow laws and policies. Thereafter, whenever the white power structure was perceived to be under threat anywhere in the US, the KKK membership would swell and be in key positions to legitimately lobby, march, demonstrate by cross burnings, lynchings and by burning people out of their homes. They were rarely opposed by the local population or local law enforcement.
Below are links to photos of the famous 1925 KKK march in Washington, DC. At the time, the largest KKK contingents were from Indiana, California and Alabama.
Pennsylvania Avenue
Pennsylvania Avenue
On the steps of the US Capitol